1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a handy-type copying device, and more particularly to a handy-type copying device for copying one or more character strings without breaking them.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There are many cases where we may want to copy some items from an original material to produce a label for affixing to copied material. For example, when a backup diskette is created from an original software diskette for use in a two disk drive system of a personal computer, the user may want to affix a label referencing the software to the backup diskette. If the backup diskette has a label indicating the title of the software, diskette number or the like, it is convenient for the user to identify the diskette.
It is general that an original material carries a printed list of various items. To copy the printed list with a hand-held copying machine with a roll of thermal paper, the reader of the hand-held copying machine may be held against an area to be copied, and moved to a desired position thus copying the titles and other information. Another way of copying the printed list is to use a character tape producing machine which prints desired characters or the like on an adhesive tape. The characters and numerals such as "ABC SOFTWARE Ver. 1.0" are entered through an input device such as a keyboard or the like, and printed on the adhesive tape. According to still another method, the object is read by an image reader, and the thus read data is inputted to a personal computer set. The read data is then printed on a print paper by a printer, and the printed paper is cut into a tape.
However, the aforesaid conventional devices have suffered the following drawbacks. In the case of using a hand-held copying machine, since the copying machine is manually moved by the user while copying the desired object, it is difficult to move the copying machine linearly at constant speed. The copied character string or strings tend to be undulated or interrupted. In the case of a character tape producing machine, it is inconvenient to print characters other than alphanumerals, such as in the case of printing chinese characters, since the user has to search a target character among a plurality of options. Besides, the character tape producing machine is expensive because it is made up of a number of electronic components. In the case of a personal computer set, the use of the image reader, the cutting of the printed paper into a long narrow tape, etc. results in a procedure that is tedious and time-consuming.